


things you said under the stars and in the grass

by Lady_Slytherin



Category: Twelfth Grade (or Whatever) (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, Other, Prompt Fill, but if that's not the best way to tag it feel free to let me know, i tagged this as F/F and other because Viola is a demigirl and i wasn't sure which was better to do
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-19
Updated: 2016-08-19
Packaged: 2018-08-09 16:53:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7809844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Slytherin/pseuds/Lady_Slytherin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>They were lying on the grass in a field, and the stars were so beautiful that it was as if the universe existed in one unbroken piece, stretching from end to end.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	things you said under the stars and in the grass

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AccioInvisibilityCloak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AccioInvisibilityCloak/gifts).



They were lying on the grass in a field, and the stars were so beautiful that it was as if the universe existed in one unbroken piece, stretching from end to end. It was one of those in-between nights, where the weather had gone from freezing to kind of all right in an instant, but could easily turn back. Liv looked up the stars, then turned her head to the side to look at Viola.

“So,” she said. “What’s it like?”

“You mean college? Um, it’s okay,” Viola said. She turned her head as well, just slightly so that they were making eye contact. “I mean, I’m mostly taking my gen eds right now, which aren’t really that exciting. Except the history one, obviously. I mean, you read my texts after that one. Next quarter should be really cool though, I get to take my first film studies class.” 

Liv nodded, trying not to let any envy seep into her face. It was good that Viola liked college, even if it was far away. “I wish you were here for longer than a week,” she said quietly. “I miss you.”

“Ah, thanks, Liv. I’ve missed you too. I’m sorry I couldn’t come for winter break, but you know how it is. Had to spend Hannukah with the fam and all that.”

“It’s nice of Drew to let you stay with him for spring break.”

“I don’t think he and Oren have even noticed I’m here, to be honest.”

“Are they dating yet?”

“Who knows. They’re something, anyway. I try not to pry to much unless it feels like Oren wants me to.”

“Right. That makes sense.” Liv looked back up at the stars. Lying on the grass in a park at night was exactly the sort of romanticized teen experience she’d always hoped she’d have. Now that she had it, she was scared it’d be gone to soon. What if she tried to cling to hard, what if she spent all of this time counting down seconds until it had to end? What if she didn’t enjoy it enough?

“How did your class go this winter?” Viola asked.

“Good. I think. I did really well on the academic part, anyway. I even managed to raise my hand and talk a few times, even though the teacher knew about my anxiety and said I didn’t have to.”

“Liv! That’s great.”

“Thanks.” She’d enrolled in community college for winter quarter. All she’d taken was poetry, but it was the first time Liv had been in a classroom in years. “I just wish I knew how to actually talk to people. There were all of these girls in my class who just magically seemed to know each other, and I couldn’t even figure out how to say hi to them most days. It always felt like they knew I didn’t have any friends.”

Viola nudged her shoulder. “I’m your friend.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yeah, I do. But look at it this way, you made it into an IRL classroom, right? That’s huge.”

“I guess so. I just really wish I had more people to talk to. I mean, you and I text all the time, and Maria and Tammi are still around, but there’s not really anyone else. I don’t know how to make friends anymore.”

“You should get Sebastian to talk you up. You’ve seen that video where he demanded that I become friends with you right away, right?”

Liv didn’t point out that Sebastian didn’t live anywhere near her, so it didn’t actually matter how much he talked her up. Viola was just trying to help. It wasn’t her fault that talking to people felt like climbing Mount Everest some days. “Yeah. Sebastian’s nice, I like him a lot.”

Viola nodded. She looked away. “Hey, so speaking of my brother, he made me promise I’d talk to you about something instead of avoiding the conversation forever like I would normally do.”

Liv’s heart instantly started beating uncomfortably fast. She sat up, feeling the blood pumping at the surface of her skin. “Is everything okay? Did I do something?”

“No, no, no, it’s okay,” Viola said. She changed positions so that she was sitting as well. “It’s nothing bad, I promise. Sorry, I shouldn’t have prefaced that so vaguely, that probably made you really anxious. I just wanted to ask something.”

This didn’t help much, but Liv managed to nod. “Yeah, go ahead. What did you want to ask?”

“So, you know that thing last year where you were really into me and I wasn’t really in the best place for a relationship.”

“Of course.” Liv bit back the words _you kind of broke my heart._ She understood now, as much as she could understand. Sometimes things didn’t work out no matter how badly you wanted them to. The universe wasn’t nearly as whole and unbroken as it was pretending to be tonight.

“If I was ready now, is that something you’d still be interested in?”

Liv could feel her whole body tense up. Her breath started coming faster, not to the point where she was hyperventilating but still too fast. “Shit,” she whispered, burying her face in her hands. Damn it. She’d wanted this for so long, and now that it was happening, all she could do was break down. Her chest tightened painfully

“Liv, it’s okay,” Viola said, reaching out to rub her shoulder gently. “You don’t have to say yes. Shit, I’m sorry, I really didn’t mean to make you—do you just want to forget I asked that? Because we can just forget about it, it’s not a big deal.”

“I want to say yes,” Liv said in a rush. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why this is happening. I really, really want to say yes to what you just asked. But now I’m panicking, and I don’t know why, and—”

“It’s okay,” Viola repeated. “What do you want to do? Should we change the subject until you’re ready? Because Oren did something pretty ridiculous the other day, and I’ve been dying to tell you about it. You’re gonna think it’s really funny.”

Liv nodded vigorously. “Yeah, tell me the Oren story. I’m sorry, I’ll be okay in a minute.” 

“So he had two back to back classes last quarter, right? Only they were fifteen minutes apart and in the same building, so he’d always turn up really early to the second one because it wasn’t like there was time to do anything else. But he said it started feeling kind of awkward always being the first one there? Anyway, he decided that what he needed to do was come up with a way to slow himself down enough that he wouldn’t be there so early.”

“So what did he do?” Liv leaned into the hand on her shoulder and tried to regulate her breathing. _It’s going to be okay,_ she told herself, and she almost managed to believe it.

“He tied his shoelaces together. Really tight too, so when he realized that it was actually kind of hard to get places, he couldn’t actually undo them. He had to bunny-hop all the way to both classes.”

“That’s funny,” Liv said. “Did he manage to untie them?”

“Nope. We had to cut him loose with my Swiss army knife. He spent the next two weeks with no laces in those shoes before he finally got off campus and bought new ones. It did technically work though, because it took him twenty minutes to get up the stairs to his second class so he ended up being late.”

“Wow. I can’t imagine doing anything like that.” 

“Me neither. But that’s Oren, right?”

“Yeah, that’s Oren.”

Viola touched her shoulder. “You doing any better, or should I keep talking?”

“I’m doing a bit better. I’m sorry, you must think I’m the biggest loser in the world,” Liv said, looking down. “I mean, who has an anxiety attack when they’re getting asked out?”

“Hey, don’t call my friend Liv a loser,” Viola said. She nudged Liv’s shoulder with her own. “She’s super cool and I have kind of a huge crush on her. I was actually thinking of trying to ask her out again, if she’d be okay with that.”

A feeling of warmth spread through Liv’s body, and she found herself smiling. “I think she’d allow it.”

Viola turned and looked her in the eye. “Liv Belcik, would you maybe want to go out with me?”

This time, Liv was ready. “Yes,” she said, before her anxiety or anything else in the world could swoop in and stop her.

“Great! Awesome. So what do you want to do, go to a movie tomorrow or something?”

Liv laughed. “Weren’t we already planning on going to a movie tomorrow?”

“Oh shit, you’re right. Well, we could go to Starbucks _after_ the movie. Or we could see another movie. Just back to back movies, all day long.”

“Starbucks sounds good.”

“Okay, Starbucks it is.”

Liv hesitated, then leaned in to rest her head on Viola’s shoulder. Almost at once, Viola’s arm went around her, as though she’d just been waiting for this cue. 

“Look,” Viola whispered, pointing across the field with her free hand. “Lightning bugs.”

Liv could just make them out: first one, then more and more as her eyes learned what to look for. It was like when the stars first came out at night. At first, they were hard to find, and then suddenly, they were everywhere.

“Thank you,” she whispered to Viola, the fireflies, the sky. Maybe it didn’t matter if the universe was one unbroken piece or a shattered mosaic. Maybe all that mattered was that she was here in this moment to experience it.


End file.
